


Telling Mushrooms from Toadstools

by There_Was_A_Star_Danced



Category: Howl Series - Diana Wynne Jones, Howl no Ugoku Shiro | Howl's Moving Castle, Howl's Moving Castle - All Media Types
Genre: (like 5 things + 1 things), 7 Things, Almost everything is background to the Howl/Sophie relationship, Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, Fluff, Modern AU, millennial AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2019-09-22
Packaged: 2020-10-25 17:49:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20728295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/There_Was_A_Star_Danced/pseuds/There_Was_A_Star_Danced
Summary: “If only one could tell true love from false love as one can tell mushrooms from toadstools.” -Katherine MansfieldSeven times Howl threw rocks at Sophie's window for seven different reasons.~Excerpt from Chapter 1:"Howl’s walk back to his motorcycle was far less dejected than it had any right to be. Lettie would soften towards him, eventually. Provided there was nobody else, and he didn’t think there was. And in the meantime, he could ask her about her intriguing sister. From a little grey field-mouse to a fiery cat. Interesting.Sophie Hatter.He smiled again, replaying the events of the night. Over and over, he slowed to replay every word of the fiery little cat. He had a feeling… just a hunch, mind you… that he would see her again."





	Telling Mushrooms from Toadstools

Howell Jenkins (or Howl Pendragon, as he preferred) cut the engine of his motorcycle a block away from the Hatter’s house and propped it up with the kickstand. He slid off and began walking, counting house-numbers as he came. It was best if no one knew he was here. Not that it mattered to him, but Lettie might not appreciate it if he did any damage to her reputation. It was eleven o’clock at night, after all. He smiled in the moonlight. Lovely, lovely, Lettie Hatter. 

They had met in class. Brilliant, headstrong Lettie Hatter had convinced her widowed step-mother to send her on a fast-track through Oxford while still in high school. Her dark good looks attracted Howell, who always kept and an eye out for the prettiest girl in the room, and her strength of mind surprised him. It had been a while since he met someone who was a challenge. 

He thought she was weakening towards him, and so he devised taking her for a moonlit ride on his motorcycle. Hence, his stealing up to her home in the middle of the night. 

His feet crunched on the pea-gravel walkway as he made his way to the house. There was a light burning in one window. It must be Lettie. There was an exam tomorrow, and if he had any sense, he would be at home reviewing for it. He felt a little guilty about shirking the prep time, but he always slithered out of unpleasant things and he’d only taken the class for Lettie’s sake. 

Under the window, a thought struck him and he turned back to scoop up a handful of pea gravel. What was more romantic than a lover throwing pebbles at the window of his beloved to capture her attention?

He went back to stand beneath Lettie’s window. At least, he assumed it was Lettie’s. He knew this was the correct house, but he’d only seen it from the street and could only guess at the window. But the light was on, and since they both had the exam tomorrow, he assumed it was hers. 

Shifting the cool round stones to one hand, he picked out a good dozen and pelted them at the window. He followed this up with a sharp hiss of “Lettie!” and waited. When nothing happened, he repeated the process. And again. The grass was wet with dew. He could sense it seeping into his socks.

On the fourth try, a figure appeared behind the curtain and pulled it aside. In another quick movement, they slid the window up and stuck out their head. 

It was not Lettie. 

Howl’s eyes widened as he looked up into red-rimmed blue eyes peering out from a piquant white face with a mane of red hair falling over one shoulder and standing out against a grey sweater. 

~

Five minutes earlier, Sophie Hatter had just finished tying off one bunch of roses on a commissioned hat she’d send off tomorrow. 

When Father had died a year ago, Fanny had thought what a pity it would be to close her online Vintage Hat shop so she could run her husband’s prosperous antique store. Father invested so much in Fanny’s shop. It had allowed her to be at home to raise the girls, too, which they still needed. Well, Martha and Lettie needed. Sophie had just graduated, and Fanny had struck on the happy idea of Sophie running the hat shop while Fanny ran the antique shop. 

Sophie had agreed. With Lettie wanting to go to Oxford early and Martha still in High School, they couldn’t afford to send Sophie, nor could they afford to lose a source of income. Sophie was a great needlewoman. And she would be home anyhow if she wasn’t going to college. 

Hatter's Hat Shop had bloomed under Sophie’s touch. Fanny was an excellent saleswoman and still managed the shop’s marketing, but Sophie was the better needlewoman and had an eye for design. It wasn’t too long after Father’s death that they had bounced back, but the shop’s popularity meant long hours keeping up with the demand for Sophie. 

“Hence,” said Sophie, “why I am sitting here with hats at 11 pm when I should be in bed. Shame on me.”

She dropped the hat on its stand and jumped as a hail of pebbles fell across the window. She sat still and waited. It came again. She stood and moved to the window, pushing open the edge of the curtain to peep out. She practically fainted. 

At first sight outside was a floating blonde head, detached from anything, hovering outside her window. As it turned around, Sophie caught sight of a flash of white shirt under the dark jacket of the man. She breathed a sigh of relief. At least it wasn’t a bodiless monster. She eyed the face and hair she could see outside. There was something…

He threw another handful of gravel at the window and called out “Lettie!” in a low voice. 

Sophie growled. What right had Lettie’s suitors to come crawling around the house at all hours? She was sure Lettie could not have encouraged him… She remembered him now. Not that it made a difference. He’d only seen her long enough to call her a mouse. 

She pushed aside the curtains and shot the frame up, sticking her head out. 

~

He remembered her, he realized, looking up into her face. She’d been wandering around the campus, looking scared, lost, and harassed when he had first seen her. “Looking for my sister.” Lettie, he now realized. He thought she was one of the loveliest girls he ever laid eyes on then, even in her grey sweater and drab jeans. He had asked what the little grey mouse was looking for. She told him, and he gave her directions and asked to escort her. She had excused herself and run away in a great rush, scared stiff. He thought it was a pity that her spirit didn’t have the fire of her hair. He liked spirited girls. 

Looking at her scowl now, he wasn’t sure his first assessment still stood. 

“What do you want?” she asked in clipped and weary tones. 

“I wanted to see if Lettie would go for a ride on my motorcycle. I thought this was her window.”

“At this time of night? Certainly not. Lettie’s been in bed for hours now.”

“With an essay due tomorrow? I thought she would be awake until all hours.”

“She’s a morning person. And she likes her sleep, so go away.”

“Are you sure you won’t just ask her?”

“The answer will be no. Go away.”

“Just ask her once,” Howl pleaded in his most charming accents. “If she says no, I’ll go away.”

Lettie’s sister sighed. “You promise?” She asked. Howl nodded and she disappeared, closing a defeated window.

~

This man was trouble. Sophie could just tell. He’d seemed nice enough when he’d offered her directions that one time, but now he exposed himself to be nothing but a pest of the highest order. But if asking Lettie his question would convince him to leave… she sighed again, leaving her workroom and going to find Lettie. 

“Lettie!” she hissed into the dark bedroom. A muted groan answered her, and she pushed the door open and entered. She reached and shook Lettie’s shoulder until she felt the girl move under her hand. Lettie rolled over and sat up, reaching out to turn on the bedside light. 

“Sophie? What’s the matter?” she grumbled. 

“Lettie, there’s a man outside. He’s insisting on staying until you say you don’t want to go for a ride on his motorcycle. Come and make him go away. Please.” 

Lettie groaned again, rubbing her eyes. 

“What’s he like?” she asked on a yawn. 

“Tall, blond hair, a bony, pale face. He had an accent too; it sounded Welsh.” 

Lettie groaned loudly and dropped her face into her pillow. Then she lifted it again, threw the covers off and got out of bed. 

“That’ll be Howl 'Pendragon’ Jenkins,” she said, throwing on a dressing gown. “You were right in coming to get me. He won’t leave until he’s heard a refusal from my own lips.” 

She pushed past Sophie and went to the workroom, which was closer to the ground than Lettie’s room, and stuck her head out of the window. Sophie arrived in time to hear her start in on Howl. 

“Howl Jenkins, you go away,” Sophie could hear her say. She couldn’t hear the response, but Lettie was admirably firm. She was a woman who loved her sleep and wouldn’t stand for having it interrupted. 

“No, I don’t want to. Tonight or any other night. No, don’t say a word. I will not change my mind. Now you go away and leave poor Sophie alone!” 

With that, she pulled her head in and slammed the window shut. She turned to Sophie and nodded. 

“That should handle him. For now, at least. Come get me if he doesn’t leave.” And with a final smile, Lettie went back to bed, leaving Sophie to finish the last bunches of roses on her hats. 

~

Howl’s walk back to his motorcycle was far less dejected than it had any right to be. Lettie would soften towards him, eventually. Provided there was nobody else, and he didn’t think there was. And in the meantime, he could ask her about her intriguing sister. From a little grey field-mouse to a fiery cat. Interesting. 

Sophie Hatter. 

He smiled to himself. 

He climbed back on his bike, but he did not start it. Instead, he leaned over the handlebars and peered through the darkness to the Hatter home. Two lights were still burning. One disappeared quickly, but the other stayed for quite some time. 

He told himself that he was being romantic and mooning over his Lettie’s window. But that didn’t explain why his eyes kept drifting towards that flickering light on the lower floor. 

It finally disappeared, and Howl straightened and stretched, preparing to ride home. He smiled again, replaying the events of the night. Over and over, he slowed to replay every word of the fiery little cat. He had a feeling… just a hunch, mind you… that he would see her again. 

~~~


End file.
